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The North London-based developer is the publisher's largest
UK developer acquisition since "Total War" developer The
Creative Assembly, which became part of SEGA in March 2005.

SEGA has also announced a number of high-profile partnerships
with developers including Silicon Knights, Monolith and most
recently Obsidian Entertainment.

SEGA Europe and SEGA America CEO Naoya Tsurumi called Sports
Interactive's headline title Football Manager "one of the
most significant titles for our European line-up".

"This acquisition illustrates that we are achieving our
objectives and have our strategic planning up and running.
Although we still have a lot more to do, we feel that this is
yet another huge step towards strengthening our standing
within the European market," he said in a statement this
morning.

SEGA Europe President and COO paid tribute to the company's
personnel. "We acquired Sports Interactive because SEGA has
the utmost respect for the Collyers, Miles Jacobson and the
Sports Interactive team for what they have achieved. The
company is built up of highly talented individuals that have
and continue to produce award-winning titles," he said.

Miles Jacobson, Managing Director of Sports Interactive,
added, "From our first meeting with SEGA, it felt like
'home'- they really understand development and it's an honour
to get to work with the overwhelming pool of talent from both
the development and publishing side. The partner was right
for the next chapter in Sports Interactive's history, with
more releases from the studio this year than ever before.
Myself, Ov, Paul and the SI team are all really excited about
the future."

Founded in 1994 by Paul and Oliver Collyer, Sports
Interactive developed the Championship Manager series of
football management titles until a split from publisher Eidos
in 2004 forced it to surrender the name and rebrand as
Football Manager.

The unprecedented rebranding made little difference to the
firm's success, as SEGA subsequently agreed a deal to publish
"Football Manager" for five years, and sold 1.5 million
copies of the first two editions, 2005 and 2006.

Along with Football Manager, Sports Interactive recently
expanded in other areas of the sports management genre,
bringing popular independent titles NHL: Eastside Hockey
Manager and Out of the Park Baseball into the fold.

As part of the deal announced to the Japanese stock exchange
this morning, the company will continue to develop these
three series, but will also be given the opportunity to
expand into new areas.

The company's next scheduled releases are Football Manager
2006 for Xbox 360 and PSP, both of which are due out on April
13th.